NYC wants to have less homeless people even if that means buying them a one way ticket out of town. The Bloomberg administration has paid for 550 homeless people to leave the city, including flying people to "Paris ($6,332), Orlando ($858.40), Johannesburg ($2,550.70), or most frequently, San Juan ($484.20)." Department of Homeless Services employees do all the planning for international travel.
Let me put it this way, If you got that phone call, and you actually care about the person in question, how could you bring yourself to say no? I think it's more than a little unfair for New York to guilt-trip people into solving the city's civic problems. The program fails to address the underlying problems that brought the families here in the first place.
Bloomberg says, " I don’t know, when they get to the other places, whether they find jobs. It may be an easier place for them. If we don’t — we either have two choices. We can do this program or pay an enormous amount of money daily to provide housing."
By reading between the lines it's okay for these people to be homeless, just not in New York City. My concern on this is what the Bloomberg administration is not saying, the homeless numbers must be so alarming that with all the unemployment and unemployment checks running out, the city has a big problem, with vacant commercial space, empty high rises everywhere and new college grads leaving the city - the city once again only seems to be interested in masking the real problem.
Well, did you know the city is paying Bushwick Economic Development Corp about $2,700 a month for each apartment after they signed a 10-year contract to turn a 67-unit building on East New York Ave into a shelter, that also covers social services like job counseling. Of course, some neighbors who go to work every day to pay obscene rent on their depressing dumps are furious.
Through the Housing Asset Renewal Program (HARP), the City will negotiate with developers and banks and provide financing to turn unsold or stalled units intended to be sold or rented at market rate into affordable housing. As many as 400 units could be converted as part of the pilot program. The cost of this program is in up-wards of $20 million. This Program will focus on two types of problematic developments: completed projects with a high number of vacancies and stalled sites that are still under construction. HPD will issue a Notice of Funding Availability for the new program in late July. Projects will be selected through a competitive process based on three goals:
* Neighborhood Stabilization – Priority will be given to buildings in neighborhoods that will have the greatest impact on keeping communities stable;
* Efficient Use of Public Funding – Preference will be given to projects that need the lowest amount of public assistance to achieve maximum afford ability;
* Deep Discounts to New Yorkers – Projects will be selected based on which developers and banks offer the deepest discounts below market rates on prospective units.
The city estimates the average cost of HARP housing to be below the $75,000 to $100,000 it spends to build each affordable housing unit from scratch—not quite $1,000 per square foot. But according to my own estimations the city has a very different view of what they consider affordable housing.
Since living in this city for 5+ years, I haven't seen a damn thing being done for working people who pay taxes, or the elderly, either, you have to be literally homeless and in the shelter system with no job, or working a job/career that pays you so well that none of this is of any concern. You can't be in the middle because the middle doesn't get any help period. It would be much more cost effective to help people who have an income and are at a better position to take advantage of entrepreneurships, increase job training which in turn creates jobs and stimulate the economy. Not for people who can't afford a baby sitter have 2+ kids another one the way, and look to the government for every bit of help without a drop of self sufficiency. Single people I would like to mention get no help what so ever, when they are in an ideal position to be self sufficient and can contribute something back to the communities economy much quicker. Not to mention if you are married with no children the government does not consider you a family unit, so, once again the system does very little if any to help.
While the developers and banks would take a financial hit on some of their units, the deals would let them complete projects, according to city officials. In other words help them continue to build more unaffordable housing and weigh out the market until it adjusts itself. Although paying families to leave the city has being going on since 2007 it is strange that it is getting attention now, but to get back on track some developers would rather leave their buildings vacant then sign a deal with the city to turn it into a shelter or even affordable housing where families can wait for years to get into public housing or into the section 8 program where the city pays 90% of the recipients rent not to mention food stamps, medicaid, cash assistants and furniture allowance .
In there lies the evil fingerprints as to why affordable housing will never be addressed in this city. The bottom-line is profit margin and not preventing homelessness so the city can appear as though there is no homeless problem, or the homeless problem isn't as bad as we know it is, but as we all know appearances are very deceiving.
Links of Information:
Facts about the real homeless numbers
Fiscal 2009 Preliminary Capital Budget Report
MAYOR BLOOMBERG AND SPEAKER QUINN ANNOUNCE HOUSING ASSET RENEWAL PILOT PROGRAM
Human Resources Administration budget plans
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